Denis Poroy/AP
Beleaguered California Republican congressman Duncan Hunter, who was indicted last year for illegally using campaign funds to pay for personal expenses, recently took a trip to Yuma, Arizona, to demonstrate once and for all how easy it is to cross the border between the United States and Mexico.
In a Facebook video released Thursday, Hunter, looking like an unshaven undercover agent standing in the dark, claimed to be 15 meters from the border with Mexico. He said that the country was being “overwhelmed” by immigrants trying to enter and wanted to show exactly how porous our borders were. He repeated how necessary it was for Congress to “secure the border and build a wall.”
Late night ride-along with U.S. Border Patrol in Yuma, AZ. pic.twitter.com/azbsFCKvaV
— Rep. Duncan Hunter (@Rep_Hunter) April 18, 2019
“We expect to stop transnational terrorists, families, all illegal aliens from crossing the border,” he said incredulously as he pointed to a low fence he thought marked the border and easily climbed over it. Unfortunately, he missed his target. A Border Patrol spokesman told the Times of San Diego that the actual border was along the Colorado River 100 feet away from where Hunter stood.
“Hunter either broke the law and violated conditions of his release issued by a judge not to leave the continental US, or he was pulling a political stunt and lied,” his one-time Democratic opponent Ammar Campa-Najjar said in a statement to NBC News on Friday. Earlier this year, Campa-Najjar announced he would challenge Hunter again in 2020.
In August, a federal judge told Hunter and his wife Margaret, his former campaign manager, that they couldn’t leave the United States or travel to Mexico while they were out on bail. Hunter’s spokesman told the Times of San Diego that Campa-Najjar’s insistence that Hunter violated his parole represented a “non-issue typical of someone desperate for a headline” that took the focus away from border security.
This is what happens when you’ve been stripped from all your committees & have too much time on your hands.
Hunter‘s power has been revoked by his own party, leaving #CA50 with no voice.
Leaders like @SpeakerRyan, the people who know him the most, trust him the least. https://t.co/oixiDKXZoj
— Ammar Campa-Najjar (@ACampaNajjar) April 19, 2019
Hunter and his wife are expected to go on trial in September.
